Character Studies #16 - Solomon

“Solomon – The King Who Had It All”

Photos in God’s Album Series

—King Solomon—

1 Kings 3:1-14

INTRODUCTION:

Most of us consider ourselves to be reasonably intelligent. But have you ever done anything colossally stupid that you regretted later? I certainly have—more times than I care to admit. You probably watched the movie, “Forrest Gump,” starring Tom Hanks. In that film, Hanks plays the part of a guy who is not very smart but who is good to the core, does kind deeds, and says wise things. That is an interesting combination because we expect that a dumb guy would act stupidly and say stupid things. It just proves that wisdom and intelligence do not necessarily always go together. 

Then, of course, there is Solomon in the Bible—the son of King David. He was heir to the throne of Israel, born into wealth, power, and opulence. Yet soon after he was crowned king, he had one of those “Ah-ha” lightbulb over the head moments in which he realized that he was not up to the task of ruling over Israel. This is all explained in 1 Kings 3:1-14. Let’s look at that to get the context.

¹ Then Solomon formed a marriage alliance with Pharaoh king of Egypt and took Pharaoh’s daughter and brought her to the city of David until he had finished building his own house and the house of the Lord and the wall around Jerusalem. ² The people were still sacrificing on the high places, because there was no house built for the name of the Lord until those days. ³ Now Solomon loved the Lord, walking in the statutes of his father David, except he sacrificed and burned incense on the high places. ⁴ The king went to Gibeon to sacrifice there, for that was the great high place; Solomon offered a thousand burnt offerings on that altar. ⁵ In Gibeon the Lord appeared to Solomon in a dream at night; and God said, “Ask what you wish Me to give you.” ⁶ Then Solomon said, “You have shown great lovingkindness to Your servant David my father, according as he walked before You in truth and righteousness and uprightness of heart toward You; and You have reserved for him this great lovingkindness, that You have given him a son to sit on his throne, as it is this day. ⁷ Now, O Lord my God, You have made Your servant king in place of my father David, yet I am but a little child; I do not know how to go out or come in. ⁸ Your servant is in the midst of Your people which You have chosen, a great people who are too many to be numbered or counted. ⁹ So give Your servant an understanding heart to judge Your people to discern between good and evil. For who is able to judge this great people of Yours?” ¹⁰ It was pleasing in the sight of the Lord that Solomon had asked this thing. ¹¹ God said to him, “Because you have asked this thing and have not asked for yourself long life, nor have asked riches for yourself, nor have you asked for the life of your enemies, but have asked for yourself discernment to understand justice, ¹² behold, I have done according to your words. Behold, I have given you a wise and discerning heart, so that there has been no one like you before you, nor shall one like you arise after you. ¹³ I have also given you what you have not asked, both riches and honor, so that there will not be any among the kings like you all your days. ¹⁴ If you walk in My ways, keeping My statutes and commandments, as your father David walked, then I will prolong your days.” 

So far, so good, but Solomon is well known to us, not only for his great wisdom, but also for exercising incredibly bad judgment in his personal life. Oh sure, we all remember his wisdom in deciding the case between the two women who both claimed to be the mother of the same little baby. But this is the same Solomon who according to 1 Kings 11:1-8 ended up with 700 wives and 300 concubines! Any married man will tell you that was a serious lapse in good judgment! No wisdom there! Let’s look at that passage: 

¹ Now King Solomon loved many foreign women along with the daughter of Pharaoh: Moabite, Ammonite, Edomite, Sidonian, and Hittite women, ² from the nations concerning which the Lord had said to the sons of Israel, “You shall not associate with them, nor shall they associate with you, for they will surely turn your heart away after their gods.” Solomon held fast to these in love. ³ He had seven hundred wives, princesses, and three hundred concubines, and his wives turned his heart away. ⁴ For when Solomon was old, his wives turned his heart away after other gods; and his heart was not wholly devoted to the Lord his God, as the heart of David his father had been. ⁵ For Solomon went after Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians and after Milcom the detestable idol of the Ammonites. ⁶ Solomon did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, and did not follow the Lord fully, as David his father had done. ⁷ Then Solomon built a high place for Chemosh the detestable idol of Moab, on the mountain, which is east of Jerusalem, and for Molech the detestable idol of the sons of Ammon. ⁸ Thus also he did for all his foreign wives, who burned incense and sacrificed to their gods. 

So how are we to understand and evaluate Solomon? The Bible says he was the wisest man who ever lived (at least in some areas). But that same Bible paints a picture of him as a total moron regarding spending money, and in marital and family relationships. Yet through it all he seems to have learned some important life lessons through his experiences. That, in and of itself, is admirable. Too many of us go bumbling through life without learning anything worth passing on to the next generations. 

TRANSITION:

Despite his lapses in judgment and his outright screw-ups, God thought enough of Solomon to use him to write three books in our Bible: Canticles (aka Song of Solomon), Proverbs, and Ecclesiastes. When looked at together, these three books serve as a rough outline of Solomon’s life. The ancient Jewish scholars tell us that he first wrote the Song of Solomon at the very beginning of his reign, while he was still young and still very much in love with his first wife and lover, identified as “the Shulamite maiden” in that book. It is a tender and intimate love story from the perspective of a man who was crazy-in-love with his wife. Next, in mid-life he wrote the Book of Proverbs, a collection of observations on life, interspersed with one-liner wise sayings that sum up his views on many subjects and situations. 

However, toward the end of his life, Solomon penned the Book of Ecclesiastes. It is strikingly different from his first two books. It is dark and depressing, filled with bitterness and cynicism. It is hard to read. It is hard to preach and teach. In fact, most of us have never heard a sermon from the Book of Ecclesiastes because most preachers bypass it in favor of more uplifting texts. However, there is much in that book that serves as a mirror for our own follies and foolishness. You will discover that Ecclesiastes is amazingly up to date in terms of the worldviews in which we are constantly stewing and simmering. Jesus said that we are “in this world” but should not be “of this world.” The life of Solomon and the Book of Ecclesiastes help us better understand why Jesus made that statement. 

NOTES on the Text:

In Ecclesiastes, we have an accurate record of Solomon’s foolish search for life’s meaning, but we can readily see that he was looking in all the wrong places. The inspired text accurately records the thoughts of a man who was walking far from God, doing life on his own terms. I tell you this because while Solomon makes many true observations in Ecclesiastes, you must be careful not to absorb everything he says at face value, because some of his conclusions are just plain wrongheaded. The doctrine of inspiration does not put God’s stamp of approval on everything in the Bible, only that it is recorded correctly. In Ecclesiastes Solomon makes some claims and draws some conclusions that are patently untrue about God and about life. 

Solomon was a complex character. Raised in the palace, heir to the throne, given everything his heart could desire, yet apparently, he still felt empty on the inside. He even had an encounter with God in which he was told to ask for anything he wanted, so he asked God for wisdom and insight into how to rule over Israel. The Bible says that God answered that prayer, in spades. Throughout his reign he was a wise and beloved leader of his people. However, his personal life was a shambles that whole time. He seemed unable to apply his wisdom to the realm of human relationships, including marriage and family.

In the Book of Proverbs, we can see the incredible wisdom of Solomon. In the Book of Ecclesiastes, we see the boundless stupidity of Solomon. They form a fascinating contrast, with both coming from the pen of the same man. In Ecclesiastes 1:12-14 Solomon lays out for us his thesis. He says: “I, the Teacher, was king of Israel, and I lived in Jerusalem. ¹³ I devoted myself to search for understanding and to explore by wisdom everything being done under heaven. I soon discovered that God has dealt a tragic existence to the human race. ¹⁴ I observed everything going on under the sun, and really, it is all meaningless—like chasing the wind” (NLT). In chapter 2 we find Solomon following yet another course to find satisfaction in life. This route he chooses is also a popular route for modern man who seeks to know the meaning of life. 

Solomon searched through a variety of “pleasures” (1-3):

¹ I said to myself, “Come now, I will test you with pleasure. So, enjoy yourself.” And behold, it too was futility. ² I said of laughter, “It is madness,” and of pleasure, “What does it accomplish?” ³ I explored with my mind how to stimulate my body with wine while my mind was guiding me wisely, and how to take hold of folly, until I could see what good there is for the sons of men to do under heaven the few years of their lives.

 

1. Solomon seems to have tried everything known in the way of pleasure, including all kinds of laughter, mirth, and even substance abuse (v. 3).
1. “Pleasure” – The implication here is sexual pleasure. Solomon makes this even clearer down in verse 8. He explored every form of human sexuality, in the end being left empty and dissatisfied. Surely this should resonate with our society and generation.
2. “Laughter” – I cannot help noticing the upsurge in the last few years of people wanting to be “stand-up comedians.” That phrase did not even exist a few years ago. Now we have thousands of people just trying to make us laugh as though laughter and hilarity were the most important things in life. I imagine that Solomon surrounded himself with funny guys to try and take his mind off his troubles. However, it does not work!
3. “Stimulate my body” – Solomon would have fit right in with my generation—the Woodstock kids, the flower children, the LSD crowd from the Summer of Love. Solomon would have loved Timothy Leary. He was limited to using alcohol to get high but if he had found anything stronger, he would have certainly tried it. He says in verse 3 that he actually “explored with his mind how to stimulate his body with wine.” He’s telling us that he applied the scientific method to the study of how best to get bombed out of his gourd!
2. Notice that he claims to have done all this, all the while retaining his perception (vs. 4, “…while my mind was guiding me wisely”). That is debatable! That is what every drunk says when he gets stopped by the police for swerving all over the road.
3. Solomon’s conclusion: All these things he found to be devoid of true meaning and heart satisfaction (cf. verse 12). 

Solomon searched for satisfaction in his great achievements (4-7):

⁴ I enlarged my works: I built houses for myself, I planted vineyards for myself; ⁵ I made gardens and parks for myself, and I planted in them all kinds of fruit trees; ⁶ I made ponds of water for myself from which to irrigate a forest of growing trees. ⁷ I bought male and female slaves and I had homeborn slaves. Also, I possessed flocks and herds larger than all who preceded me in Jerusalem.

1. Like a lot of people, he tried to cover up his unhappiness with lots of activity. He took up carpentry, winemaking, gardening, and horticulture. These became hobbies for Solomon. He built great buildings. He established huge irrigation systems and undertook huge public works projects. It is now known that snow was brought down from Mt. Hermon so that he could have cold drinks in the summertime. He obviously was trying to exceed all who had come before him and claimed that he succeeded in this.
2. He sought satisfaction in “things.” He apparently got into both human and animal husbandry, raising livestock (horses, cattle, sheep, camels) and breeding slaves.

Solomon describes his search for satisfaction in wealth and fame (8-10):

⁸ Also, I collected for myself silver and gold and the treasure of kings and provinces. I provided for myself male and female singers and the pleasures of men—many concubines. ⁹ Then I became great and increased more than all who preceded me in Jerusalem. My wisdom also stood by me. ¹⁰All that my eyes desired I did not refuse them. I did not withhold my heart from any pleasure, for my heart was pleased because of all my labor and this was my reward for all my labor.

 

1. He accumulated servants, possessions, and riches. He believed that these material things would satisfy him, so he went for them in a big way. Of course, the only way he could get all this wealth was through taxation of the people. In Solomon’s case he also had some huge gold mines.
2. He even tried the music scene. He hired the best musicians that money could buy. He surrounded himself with music. That sounds disturbingly modern, doesn’t it?
3. He gave all his energies to a full gratification of the flesh. He is very forthright here in admitting that he gave himself whatever his evil little heart desired. He had the money, and he had the power to make it happen. Who could tell him, “NO”?
4. The last part of verse 9 is a head-scratcher: “My wisdom also stood by me.” I do not think so! He is fooling himself here. Any sane person can see that he was acting like an entitled little spoiled brat.
5. In verse 10 he claims that all these goodies were in a sense his right due to his hard work. They were his rightful wages. But is that true? Is that how God would look at this? I do not think so. Kings have always had the idea that they were somehow entitled to their wealth by a divine right. But did God ever say that? No! 

Solomon sums up the conclusion of all his experimentation (11):

¹¹ Thus I considered all my activities which my hands had done and the labor which I had exerted and behold all was vanity and striving after wind and there was no profit under the sun.

 

1. He concludes that life is devoid of ultimate meaning and without real profit, despite all his material possessions and accomplishments. In the end those things meant nothing to him.
2. Solomon says that at the end of this long search all he had to show for it was emptiness and chasing after the wind. There was no profit gained. He found that even the world’s absolute best things cannot satisfy the heart. The sad thing here though is that a lot of people will not take Solomon’s word for it; they will insist on making the same mistakes all over again. But eventually they will come to the same conclusions. They will say with Solomon: “Life is empty and has no meaning.”  

CONCLUSION:

We humans are wired up in such a way that we think, “If I can just do this, or have that, then I will be truly satisfied and happy. If I just had a little more money so that I could buy that thing I have been craving, then I know that my life would be truly complete.” The thing about Solomon—he had all the money, power, sex, good looks, fame, and toys that anyone could ever want. He tried it all. He had it all. He did it all. He bought it all. But at the end, he concluded, “It is all vanity—smoke, mirrors, hot air, a waste of time. It does not satisfy. It did not fill this gaping hole in my soul. It did not bring me any real happiness.” 

The danger for us is to think to ourselves, “Yeah, but maybe he just did not find the right thing. Surely, he was mistaken. Otherwise, it would mean that the things I have been chasing all my life are not going to satisfy me either and that is unthinkable.” 

Oh, dear Lord, may we have the courage to stop the crazy race long enough to consider whether we too are, as Solomon puts it, “just striving after the wind.” 

Satisfaction and meaning in life are only to be found in a personal, life-giving relationship with the One who is Life, and Light, and Love. Only when we know the One who made us can we find fulfilment and meaning in this life. Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. Do you know Him?